


all their small shared spaces

by 6eyes



Category: It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, F/M, Non-Explicit Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-12
Updated: 2017-03-12
Packaged: 2018-10-03 09:58:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10242089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/6eyes/pseuds/6eyes
Summary: a history of every place they ever held each other.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I've often wondered where charlie and dee would spend time together since they both have roommates and spend so much time with a group, so I decided to write a short piece about the places where they get together. Thanks to Mad (hyrude on tumblr) for beta reading. I hope you enjoy!

The first time sticks with her for a while, for reasons she still can’t quite put her finger on. It wasn’t the best, that’s for sure- they didn’t know each other yet, not physically. Their bodies were unfamiliar terrain the first time, and navigating had been awkward for the both of them. It wasn’t the most passionate, the most mind-blowing, the most anything, to be honest. But it had been the first. 

 

They’ve fallen down on top of each other into Dee’s couch countless times. The reason for this is unclear; the beige sofa is far from roomy or even especially comfortable. Having sex on the couch means rug burn, toes jammed against the armrests and elbows caught between cushions. They’ve fallen off of it several times, tumbled onto the floor and had to re-orient, awkwardly check for injuries, then decide whether to stick it out on the floor or move. 

 

But somehow they end up on the couch again and again, squished against each other, sharing her macramé afghan. Maybe it has to do with that first time, the spontaneity of it, the thrill of doing something new and unknown, almost forbidden. Maybe they’re trying to hold onto the feeling of a one-time thing, fool themselves into acting like each encounter is an outlier, even as they slip into routine.

 

That isn’t to say that they’ve never done it in Dee’s bed, because they have. But the fact that she shares it with Mac and Dennis, and later Old Black Man, makes it a pretty inaccessible location. Dee’s bed is a special occasion, an oasis. (Charlie hadn’t spent a single night at his own place when Mac and Dennis moved to the suburbs.) They try to make it romantic when they’re in Dee’s bed, although neither of them really have a handle on what that amounts to; mood lighting means Charlie getting distracted by a lava lamp, rose petals mean vacuuming in the morning, lingerie means frustratingly complicated zippers and buttons that neither of them can undo. But they both put an effort in, and it still feels extraordinary to wake up next to him on a real mattress under real covers, even if he’s sprawled out and drooling on her pillow.

 

The opposite goes for Charlie’s bed. Having sex on his rickety pullout couch is a spur-of-the-moment thing only, something to be avoided, a last resort. The sheets are always dirty and the bed always has crumbs in it. The room stinks. The possibility of Frank walking in on them looms over her. She insists on being on top every time, so she can touch as little of the soiled mattress as possible. But it’s always good when they’re at Charlie’s. If she wants him bad enough to do it at his place, it’s no longer just wanting- it’s needing. Fucking in Charlie’s bed is hot, rough and usually drunk. It’s rushed and thrilling and sometimes it’s angry. They’re at their most passionate on his filthy pullout couch, clawing at and pressing into each other, ripping off clothes and nipping at each other’s throats. Dee leaves right afterwards every time, rushing out the door with messy hair. They never talk the next day. 

 

And then there are all the places in Paddy’s, all the nights they had to lock up together, all the times that Mac and Dennis and Frank would leave them out of schemes and force them to stick around while they had “owners-only” meetings. They’ve never gone all the way at the bar- that’s too low class, even for them, although they get drunk enough to get close from time to time. Certain memories stick out when it comes to her and Charlie and the bar, moments during long nights where they’d get just wasted enough to clutch at each other unselfconsciously. 

 

Charlie had called to her from the women’s bathroom one afternoon while she was in the middle of an argument with Mac and Dennis. He started to shout at her about needing help fixing a sink and she’d walked in gesturing with a beer bottle in her hand, halfway through a refusal when he pinned her against a stall. He kissed her with a peculiar intensity. 

 

“Whoa, whoa, Charlie! Dennis and everyone are right outside.” She pulled away.

 

“I know, but fuck them, they’re just being dicks, and I want you.” He said it with a sincerity that lit her up inside. She shrugged and took a swig from her beer before leaning in. They spent ten minutes feeling each other up before breaking apart breathlessly. “I think the sink is fixed now,” he muttered.

 

Then there was the time he’d become utterly fascinated by the glory hole. He bothered her about it for a week before she finally relented, just to get him to shut up. He couldn’t even get it up when she was in the other stall. She’d laughed at him and left and they didn’t do anything for a week or two after that. The next time they did hook up he wouldn’t stop making eye contact with her- That had been a weird month.

 

They’d done some stuff in the back office, but it was a risky spot. Mac had almost walked in on Charlie unhooking her bra once, but she hid under the desk in time. There was the bad room, where they would fuck around breaking bottles and then kiss until one of them invariably got cut by a piece of broken glass. Sometimes she would sit on his lap on the armchair in the bunker while cartoons played on the tv, melting into each other until she could no longer ignore the condom wrappers and empty cans of spam.

 

Her car was a last-minute location from time to time, but she’d designated it off-limits after he broke the passenger seat headrest. Dee could remember a stormy afternoon where she had straddled him in the parking lot of a deserted Wawa while the radio played in the background. She couldn’t tell if the fog on the windows was because of them or the rain.

 

Theirs was a grubby romance, a series of semi-fulfilling encounters that went unacknowledged in the aftermath. They never talked afterwards; they sprung apart every time, went cold and quiet and turned away, but they’d always rotate back to face each other eventually. Their relationship was a grimy series of cuts and bruises that they’d inflicted on each other, a map of stains that neither of them could ever fully scrub away. Neither of them minded much either way, as long as they kept the bleeding internal. They’d end up in each other’s arms again no matter what, the inevitability of their ultimate reunion a painful safety net.  For now they would force themselves to be satisfied with the occasional hook-up in all their small shared spaces. For now they would laugh off the tenderness between them.


End file.
